Amending the Budget to cover research, education, support to businesses and Cohesion Policy

The Commission is proposing to increase the 2014 level of payment appropriations by EUR 4.738 billion to cover legal obligations in research and innovation, education and support for small and medium-sized enterprises. Higher reimbursement claims from Member States in cohesion policy have to be addressed as well as the difficult situation in the Ukraine. The Commission is proposing to use unallocated margins under the payment ceiling and recourse to the special instrument, the Contingency Margin1. However, the net cost to the Member States will be significantly lower, EUR 2.165 billion, as the Commission will cash in more than EUR 1.5 billion in additional revenue, mainly from competition fines as well as more than EUR 1 billion resulting from the implementation of the 2013 budget.

Draft amending budget 3 addresses the need for additional payments for EU programmes that have been beefed up to support Europe's economic recovery, growth and jobs:Horizon 2020(research), the Youth Employment Initiative,Erasmus+(education), COSME(support to businesses). Furthermore, several legislative acts have been concluded after the adoption of the 2014 budget and require more payment appropriations.Finally, some other programmes require a top-up to cover the requirements of the past year.

Today's proposal also covers Cohesion policy as some EUR 3.4 billion is required to meet unusually high reimbursement claims from Member States, as well as the Support package to Ukraine (EUR 250 million to cover the payment of the first instalment in June 2014.

Draft amending budget 3 in detail (in EUR million)

Payment appropriations by MFF Heading

Final budget 2013

Voted budget 2014

DAB 3

Proposed increase compared with 2014 budget

Use of Unallocated Margin in 2014

Use of Contingency Margin

Total

1a

Competiveness for Growth and Jobs

12 778

11 441

305

282

587

5,1 %

1b

Economic, Social and Territorial Cohesion

56 350

50 951

3 395

3 395

6,7 %

2

Sustainable Growth: Natural Resources

57 814

56 459

6

100

106

0,2 %

3

Security and Citizenship

1 894

1 677

4

Global Europe

6 967

6 191

401

250

651

10,5 %

5

Administration

8 418

8 406

6

Compensations

75

29

Total

144 295

135 155

711

4 027

4 738

3,5 %

Of which headings 1a, 2 and 4

77 559

74 091

711

632

1 343

1,8 %

NOTE:

This is the third proposal to amend the 2014 budget.

Draft amending budget 1 was adopted in February 2014 and did not affect the overall size of the budget (reshuffling of agreed amounts within the voted budget).

Contingency Margin: A new mechanism agreed for the 2014-2020 period allowing the Commission to call for additional funding in case of unforeseen circumstances. 0.03 % of the EU-28's GNI (EUR 4 027 million in 2014) can be added to an annual budget. Future payment ceilings must be decreased by the same amount to ensure that the overall ceiling for the whole period remains unchanged.